New Series Episodes 41 & 42:The Sound Of Drums / Last Of The Time
Lords

Plot

The Doctor, Martha and Jack escape back to modern-day Earth, where they
discover that the Master -- masquerading as Harold Saxon -- has just
been elected Prime Minister of Great Britain. Before they can intervene,
the Master announces to the world that Britain has made first contact
with an alien species: the Toclafane. But the Toclafane are not the
benevolent creatures the Master is pretending... and with the Doctor
declared public enemy number one, it looks like there may be nothing to
come between his Time Lord nemesis and the end of the world.

Production

Very early in the process of developing ideas for the new Doctor
Who series in 2004, executive producer Russell T Davies conceived
the idea of a monster which would take the form of a small, flying
sphere. Possessing the personality of a sadistic child, this would in
fact be a human from the end of time, horribly mutated. For a
considerable period, the monster possessed neither a name, nor a story
in which to appear. Davies considered using it in both Dalek and The
Satan Pit when those stories ran into issues with their monsters
(the temporary loss of the rights to use the Daleks, and concerns over
the expense of computer-animating the Beast, respectively), although in
the end his own creation remained on the shelf. Ultimately, Davies'
monster -- now called the Toclafane (originally, Roclafane, but changed
to avoid similarities with the Racnoss from The
Runaway Bride) -- became the first element conceived for
Doctor Who's 2007 season finale.

Meanwhile, Davies had become intrigued by the Rogue Traders song
Voodoo Child. He had decided that the Master would feature
prominently in the wrap-up to his third season at the helm of Doctor
Who, and he found that the song helped him to crystallise his
perception of the evil Time Lord. Even before he had begun writing his
scripts, Davies had the song cleared for use in the programme. Indeed,
Voodoo Child's lyric “Here it comes, the sound of
drums” provided the first episode with its title: The Sound Of
Drums. The final installment, meanwhile, became known as Last Of
The Time Lords; Davies was writing these scripts by December
2006.

The Master's fascination with The
Teletubbies recalled the original Master watching The Clangers

As in the preceding episode, Utopia,
Davies wanted to both compare and contrast the Doctor and the Master,
and so created the character of Lucy Saxon to fill the role of the
Master's “companion”. Davies also incorporated elements of
previous Doctors in the Master's behaviour (such as his eating jelly
babies, a trait of Tom Baker's Fourth Doctor), while recalling former
Masters as well. The speech in The Sound Of Drums which began,
“Peoples of the Earth, please attend carefully,” paralleled a
similar pronouncement in the 1981 serial Logopolis, while the Master's fascination with
The Teletubbies harkened back to 1972's The
Sea Devils, in which he was seen to be watching The
Clangers, another children's programme.

Meanwhile, during the second of half of 2006, Davies decided that Martha
Jones would leave the Doctor in Last Of The Time Lords. An
ongoing element of Martha's character arc was her unrequited love for
the Doctor, and Davies felt that this would become stale if it were to
carry over into the 2008 season. He therefore decided to give Martha a
break from travelling in the TARDIS, with a view to bringing the
character back -- a little older and wiser -- partway through the
subsequent season. (Martha would also appear in Torchwood in the
interim.)

Originally, Downing Street played a much larger role in the story,
serving as the location for the last of Martha's decoy chemicals. At
this stage, Milligan was in fact a traitor, who was killed after
betraying Martha to the Master. Davies began to feel that the world of
the ravaged Earth deserved greater exploration, however, and concocted
the material involving Professor Docherty instead. Leo Jones was also
intended to appear in Last Of The Time Lords, welcoming Martha
back to Britain and introducing her to Milligan. This had to be changed
due to Reggie Yates' scheduling conflicts, which meant that he could
only spare one recording day for Doctor Who; instead, dialogue
now referred to Leo working in the Master's slave force under an assumed
name. Excised from The Sound Of Drums, albeit for reasons of
cost, was a more elaborate car chase sequence.

Russell T Davies had forgotten to include Voodoo Child but was reminded by script editor
Simon Winstone

As with 42, Saxon's female agent was
originally intended to be the same man introduced in The Lazarus Experiment; this had to be
changed when Bertie Carvel became unavailable. Vivien Rook was named for
journalist Jean Rook, while the Archangel network was first called Angel
One. Martha's suggestion that the Doctor and the Master are brothers --
dismissed by the Doctor -- was Davies' response to a popular fan theory
he found rather daft. The final scene with Jack was written to include
dialogue between him and the Doctor which playfully poked fun at the
John Barrowman voice-over accompanying each episode of Torchwood.
This was removed because it was felt to be too metatextual.

As had now become traditional, The Sound Of Drums / Last Of
The Time Lords boasted several celebrity cameos, this time famous
figures declaring their support for Harold Saxon. These included Sharon
Osbourne (host of the The X Factor and star of The
Osbournes alongside her husband, heavy metal icon Ozzy Osbourne),
pop group McFly, and Ann Widdecombe (Conservative MP and presenter of
The Widdecombe Project). Meanwhile, Davies had forgotten his
intention to include Voodoo Child in the broadcast of the story.
He was reminded only at a late stage by script editor Simon Winstone,
who had long obtained the appropriate clearances, and the song was duly
inserted into The Sound Of Drums.

The season finale formed the eighth and final block of Doctor
Who's recording schedule. The director assigned to The Sound Of
Drums / Last Of The Time Lords was Colin Teague, who had
previously helmed Ghost
Machine and Greeks Bearing
Gifts for Torchwood, as well as Invasion Of The Bane for
The Sarah Jane Adventures. Teague began filming the story on
February 7th at Upper Boat Studios, when David Tennant's performance as
the diminutive, methuselan Doctor was motion-captured for computer
animation. Two days later, the flashback material in Professor Yana's
laboratory was taped at Upper Boat, while the segments featuring the
various international news anchors were completed at BBC Wales.

The mother watching television was played by director
Colin Teague's wife, Marjorie

The first major location for The Sound Of Drums / Last Of The
Time Lords was Hensol Castle in Hensol. Recording there from
February 15th to 17th covered scenes in the rebuilt Downing Street, as
well as Vivien Rook's study, the Toclafane's address to humanity, and
the American university dorm room. Adjacent houses on Cwrt-y-Vil Road in
Penarth served as Francine's and Clive's homes on the 19th; the scene of
the mother (played by Teague's wife, Marjorie) and baby watching
television was also shot in the latter location. Leo receiving Martha's
warning was then performed at the Esplanade in Penarth, while Sharon
Osbourne's cameo was directed by Susie Liggat (who had produced Human Nature / The Family Of Blood
earlier in the season) in Buckinghamshire. February 20th again began at
Cwrt-y-Vil Road, before continuing the car chase on other Penarth
streets.

The return of the Doctor, Martha and Jack from the far future was filmed
on February 21st at The Friary in Cardiff, followed by Jack's final
scene in Millennium Square. The day concluded with the Master's election
victory address, conducted inside the Millennium Centre. On the 22nd,
the Roundwood area of Cardiff was the locale where Martha's car was
abandoned. Meanwhile, the McFly and Ann Widdecombe cameos were taped by
Liggat in London, at Universal Music and before the Houses of
Parliament, respectively. February 23rd was spent at Upper Boat,
concentrating on scenes in Martha's flat, as well as the TARDIS console
room.

Recording at Upper Boat continued from February 26th to March 1st, on
the sets of both the TARDIS and the Valiant flight deck. The
final day also included a trip to the Caerphilly Mountains, where Martha
arrived after escaping the Valiant. March 2nd started at
University Place in Cardiff, for material outside Martha's flat; cast
and crew then shifted to the old NEG Glass site at Trident Park in
Cardiff Bay, where the completion of scenes in the bowels of the
Valiant continued to the 3rd. Three more days at Upper Boat
followed from the 5th to the 7th, covering more Valiant flight
deck and TARDIS scenes. The last of these was the closing shot featuring
the apparent collision between the TARDIS and the Titanic,
leading into the 2007 Christmas special, Voyage
Of The Damned. This was taped with only minimal crew present, in
order to maintain secrecy about the special's contents.

The woman's hand picking up the Master's ring was a late
addition to the script

The venue on March 8th was Vaynor Quarry near Merther Tydfil: here,
Martha and Milligan spied on the rocket silos, the Doctor and the Master
had their climactic confrontation, and the Master's funeral pyre burned.
A late addition to the script was the woman's hand (actually production
manager Tracie Simpson) picking up the Master's ring while the evil Time
Lord's laughter echoed. Davies had decided to include this shot in order
to give future production teams a mechanism by which they could bring
the Master back. On March 9th, RAF St Athan provided the airstrip, as
well as the exteriors of the factory and Professor Docherty's shed. The
hideout to which the Doctor, Martha and Jack retreat was actually a
British Rail warehouse in Cardiff; these scenes were recorded on the
10th, and marked the end of both David Tennant's and John Barrowman's
work on the season.

Freema Agyeman, however, still had work to do covering Martha's quest
on the enslaved Earth in Last Of The Time Lords. This began on
March 12th, when Freema's return to Britain was filmed at Barry Island
Beach. This day also saw the shots of the old Time Lord and the juvenile
Master performed. The Time Lord was dressed in the Gallifreyan robes
which had been traditional since The Deadly
Assassin in 1976, and in fact the headpiece was a prop from the
original Doctor Who series. Meanwhile, at the suggestion of
script editor Gary Russell, the Master's outfit reflected the earlier
Time Lord costumes established in 1969's The War
Games.

March 13th was the final day at Upper Boat, covering the remaining
scenes on the Valiant flight deck and the Master's television
broadcast, plus a remount of the woman (once again Tracie Simpson)
recovering the Master's ring. Two Cardiff locations were visited on the
14th: Cathays Park was the site of Martha's meeting with Professor
Docherty in the episode's coda, while South Luton Place provided the
house where Martha passed along the Doctor's story and the slaves
intoned the Doctor's name.

When Colin Teague was injured, Graeme Harper made himself
available to direct the remaining scenes

On March 15th, Teague was injured in a fall at his home, and so Graeme
Harper (who had just finished 42 and Utopia) made himself available to direct
the remaining scenes. His first two days saw a return to the NEG Glass
site, posing as the interior of Docherty's shed, the factory and
Milligan's hospital; March 16th brought Agyeman's time as a Doctor
Who regular to a close. Then, on the 19th, the season's final
material -- in the cafe at the end of The Sound Of Drums -- was
completed. This had originally been scheduled for Mac's Cafe in Cardiff
on March 1st, but had been postponed and was now recorded at Forte's
Cafe on Barry Island.

With Doctor Who continuing to be extraordinarily popular, the BBC
consented to an overlong edit of Last Of The Time Lords. This
would now be screened in a 50-minute timeslot, rather than the 45-minute
duration of a typical Doctor Who episode. (A 45-minute version
was still prepared for international sales, however.) The new Doctor
Who series' third season came to an end on June 30th. This gave the
programme a hat trick of Top Ten finishes for the year, suggesting that
the viewing public was still as eager as ever for the Doctor's next
great adventure...